Meet the Grapes!
by TeaOli
Summary: A series of ficlets cut from a single multi-chaptered story. Fourth up: Hermione and Severus share a memory and a moment. Not much humor in this one.
1. Hyperbole & Prevarication

Note: This is a discarded bit from a much longer fic I'd been working on for the past few months. Since that one might _never_ be completed (it keeps growing and growing) let along posted, I figured I'd offer this up now, as (even though the fic it sprang from has gone in a different direction) writing it made me giggle.

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><p>No sooner than she'd waddled into her own sitting room from visits with the Muggle doctor and the wizarding Healer was she confronted with thin lips stretched into a thin line beneath an overlarge (and sharply hooked) nose and a furrowed brow wrinkled over piercing black eyes. Completely accustomed to such a sight, she was prepared to ignore it and launch into what she'd learned at both appointments when—<p>

"You!" her husband said darkly, dangerously even. "Come here!"

Despite the harshness of his tone, she complied with alacrity, and when he patted his lap, she lowered herself there — with no small amount of difficulty and then only with a great deal of his assistance — and looked up at him, unfazed and expectant.

"I have had a… vision," he told her.

"You don't _have_ visions," she said, looking decidedly sceptical as she settled herself more comfortably in his embrace. "And you don't believe in them any more than I do."

He pretended to sneer at her defiance. "I married _you_ because of visions, didn't I?"

"You married me for the publicity," she corrected.

"Prove it," he dared, smirking. "In any case, you cannot deny I agreed to put you in an… interesting condition in order to satisfy said visions."

To his consternation, the witch had the temerity to giggle. _Giggle_!

"Don't. Be. So. Vic_torian_," she said between little bursts of laughter that left her gasping for breath. "'Interesting condition,' indeed!" she mocked. "Can't you just say you've got me up the duff or knocked up or _something_ vaguely modern? And, Merlin help me, a vision! _You_!"

She rocked forward in her hilarity, nearly spilling out of his lap, arms flailing, and he was hard-pressed to hold on to her. When one hand flew to her lower back and the other cradled her expansive belly and she let out a resounding "Ooof!" his heart rate kicked up a truly frightening — or was that _frightened_? — rhythm.

"Darling?" he queried, pulling her securely to his chest.

"Nothing important, dearest," she assured him, sounding far more sober than she had moments before. "A vision?"

Out of the corner of his eye, he treated her to a sceptical glance that rivalled her own before answering.

"Right," he said, not entirely satisfied that all was well, but confident that she would not hesitate to inform him if anything were truly _wrong_. "I had a vision whilst you were out."

"Riiight," she drawled, patently disbelieving, but managing a cheeky grin all the same. "Tell me what you saw."

**SS~SS**

The little girl raced into the sitting room as if a rabid three-headed canine were snapping at her heels. Her chocolate-coloured wavy hair was a wild disarray that rivalled her mother's own untamed mop; the rims of her eyes and the tip of her long nose were as red as the school tie which that parent insisted on saving as a keepsake. She took one look at the tall, distinguished-looking gentleman dressed in flowing black robes who stood by the unlit fireplace and burst into a fresh bout of sobs.

"I _hate_ school," she wailed, throwing her arms around his slender legs. "And I am never going back there again!"

After gently extricating himself from the little girl's embrace, the distinguished-looking gentleman bent low, lifted her into his strong, secure arms and carried her over to the sofa. Sitting, he placed her on his knee, smoothed back her unruly tresses and wiped the tears from her eyes.

"Now, sweetest," he crooned to the now quietly weeping child, "tell Papa what is the matter."

**SS~HG**

"'Papa'?" His wife choked on a chuckle. "You expect our children to call you _'Papa_'? What's wrong with 'Dad'?"

"Who said the vision pertained to me and our offspring?"

She couldn't quite manage the single eyebrow lift, but she managed to imbue her tone with a certain amount of haughty mocking. "'Distinguished-looking gentleman dressed in flowing black robes'?"

He started to loose the scathing retort that hovered on the tip of his tongue, but a fortuitous glance at her soft pink lips and the saucy smile tugging at their corners reminded him — just in time — that he'd had better ideas in his life.

Looking at the soft pink lips had other effects than just serving as a shield against imprudent speech. Rather _pleasant_ effects, yes, but effects that happened to be inconvenient to his current endeavour. _Time for that later, _he promised himself_. _Leering at her for good measure, he turned his mind back to the matter at hand.

"Do you wish to hear the remainder of my vision, or would you prefer to continue finding fault with my recounting?"

"By all means, tell me the rest!" she said. Then had the audacity to stretch the smile into a full-blown lascivious grin before he could go on.

Shifting her over a bit so that _he_ was more comfortable — Merlin! The witch must have gained nearly a stone and half! — he raised a supercilious eyebrow.

"As I was attempting to inform you, in my vision, this poor child was being bullied at school."

**SS~SS**

"'Snooty Snanger Stranger!' he said!" Her little arms tried and failed to wrap around his trim waist, seeking comfort and assurance that all would be well. "Then they _all_ laughed at me, Papa. I'm not going back there!"

As any good father would do, he hugged her close to his chest, allowing her to cry quietly in the warm confines of his arms. Eventually the tears stopped flowing and he could convince her to make good use of the handkerchief he withdrew from a pocket in his robes.

"You mustn't pay attention to those dunderheads, my sweet _V. vinifera x amurensis_," he told her. "They aren't intelligent enough for your notice."

"But _why_ am I a Snooty Snanger, Papa?" she asked, trying to hold back a fresh wave of woe. "Mummy's a Granger and you're a Snape. Why can't I be one of those?"

He considered keeping the truth from her for the most fleeting of moments before admitting, "It's all Papa's fault." He stroked her dark, glossy curls and studied her carefully. "I _knew_ we should have called you something different, but Mummy insisted and I didn't like to hurt her feelings."

**SS~HG**

"'Veeviniferaexamurensis'?" She tipped her head back to meet his eyes and he ended up with a mouthful of bushy brown curls. "What's that?"

"Must you keep interrupting me, woman?" he grumbled, spitting out her (if he were honest, rather gorgeous) hair. "If you must know, the Severny grape is a cross between varieties of _Vitis vinifera_ and _Vitis amurensis_.

"As the girl was called 'Severny', it seemed a fitting pet name for—"

She groaned "Haven't we already talked about the Grapes?"

Spitting out another mouthful of wildly curling tresses, he ignored his wife's indignation and carried on telling his tale.

**SS~SS**

Severny scrunched up her (thankfully _not_ hooked) nose and regarded her father seriously through huge eyes the colour of toffee. "Why _not_, Papa?" When she looked up at him once again, her eyes were dry, full of curiosity and (most importantly) not nearly as red as they had been .

"Why not _what_, my little Concord?" he asked, utterly perplexed.

**SS~HG**

"You know, you can't call her that if she's got your nose."

"Call her what?"

"Concord. Little or not."

"And why not?"

Hermione made a swooping aeroplane motion with her hand.

"I will surely not refer to her as such in the presence of Muggles," Snape said. Lifting his nose (which Severny did _not_ have!) he glared at the witch in his lap until she urged him to carry on.

**SS~SS**

"Why didn't you wish to hurt Mummy's feelings?"

Chuckling softly, the potions master leant forward and pressed a kiss into the little girl's glossy dark waves. Because she was her mother's daughter, that answer wasn't nearly comprehensive enough for Severny and she requested that her dear papa clarify matters. Because she was also her _father's_ daughter, her request came out sounding much more like a demand.

"Why, Papa?" she demanded, folding stick-like arms across her scrawny chest. "Why should we worry about _Mummy's_ feelings? _She_ doesn't have to be a Snanger!"

All at once, he was nearly as serious as the tiny child sitting on his knees.

"You really mustn't blame Mummy, darling. She did mean well, and we love her even if she sometimes _does_ think like those dunderheads at your school."

And even though she could sometimes be both a stubborn brat and an obnoxious show-off, Severny decided that answer was good enough for her.

**SS~HG**

Hermione rolled her eyes at her husband, ready to launch into her argument, but a sudden signal from her abused bladder had her stiffening and struggling to pull away from his hold. She tried to heave herself from her perch on his skinny legs. Well, not _skinny_, per se; he was all wiry strength and corded muscle once the trousers came off, and— _Mustn't think such thoughts for at least the next two months!_ she admonished herself as she continued her efforts in extricating her eight-months-pregnant body from his sinewy arms.

"Don't be so silly, Severus," she chided her husband, attempting to squeeze her thighs together in the hope of avoiding disaster.

Severus chuckled softly, burying his protuberant proboscis in her cascade of curls.

"And let me go; your _son_" she emphasised the word to make sure he understood she'd seen through his ridiculous story "is dancing a one-man tarantella on my bladder!"

He waved his wand in the general direction of her hips and waist, leaving her wearing what appeared to be an adult nappy. Before she could even _begin_ to protest, he'd lifted her up into his arms and was hurriedly striding from the room.

"Mmmm, yes," he murmured, face still planted firmly in her hair. "Echion is made of sterner stuff than his little sister, so we probably didn't have the same trouble with him."

"Well," she said, biting her lip. "As long as you stick to the obscure varietals — I've never heard anyone mention Severnys or Echions — for their given names, I suppose I wouldn't mind them being Grapes. Just no Cabernet or Chardonnay, all right?"

"As far as I know, there is no Echion grape," Snape admitted. "I believe it means 'son of the viper' and was the name of one of Hermes's sons — rather fitting whichever way you look at it, don't you think? — but I've never heard of such a grape variety."

(Hermione rather thought most people wouldn't find it fitting at all — disturbing and distasteful, more like, considering the circumstances of his "death" — but most people didn't know her husband as well as she did.)

Knowing better than to start a new argument whilst he was feeling so pleased with himself, she didn't even try.

"Severus, can't you just once say 'I love you, Hermione," without resorting to exaggeration and lies?"

They reached their destination and he set her on her feet. A flick of his wand bared her from the waist down and (fervently hoping her favourite skirt and most attractive maternity knickers hadn't had disappeared forever) she slowly lowered herself onto the toilet.

"I have no idea what you are talking about, my tolerable know-it-all," he claimed as he retreated before the closing door.

~_fin H&P_~

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><p>Disclaimer: Anything you recognise belongs to JK Rowling.<p>

The inspiration for H&P was a conversation from my as-yet-unposted-anywhere SS/HG WiP, _Metempsychosis_:

"I will not curse any child with that man's name. Not even children whose mother is an insufferable, know-it-all Gryffindor."

"What would you like to call them, then?" she managed to ask bossily. "Granger? You never seemed to like it on me."

"That's because I never much liked you," he retorted with a nasty sneer. "I haven't even met these two hypothetical children yet. But you can call them whatever you like, as long as they aren't called Snape. Call them Snangers. Call them Grapes, if you want! But there will be no more Snapes or the deal's off!"


	2. UncRus

Another deleted scene from _Metempsychosis_. This one is unbetaed and largely unedited as it wasn't going to see the light of day.

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><p>"Don't be silly. Tell them you can do it," she said, folding her hands over her rounded belly. "Think of is as practice; not that you need any. There's a reason they always ask <em>you<em> when Molly isn't available."

Snape wanted to argue, but he also wanted to sleep in his own bed for the next several nights, so somehow he managed to smile and say, "All right. But I expect you to help me… practice."

"Of course I will, Severus!"

"Famous last words" was a saying which Severus Snape would have done well to remember.

SS~ASP

"UncRus."

That the voice was childish and barely comprehensible did nothing to diminish the force of its joy. Snape curled his lips into what passed for a smile only among those who knew him well and bent to pry the little boy's arms from around his right leg.

"Hello, Albus. I'm going to harvest puffapods from the greenhouse." Since there was no one else around to _see_, he ruffled the toddler's already messy hair. "No, you may not come with me. Be a good boy and go ask Hermione for a biscuit."

Albus Severus Potter frowned, making Snape chuckle at its ferocity. Giving the little boy a gentle push back towards the kitchen, he straightened and headed out the back door, making sure to secure it behind him.

"UncRus!"

Robes billowing, the tall wizard stomped towards the far end of the neat back garden, pretending not to pay attention to the imperious summons. _How the hell had the little devil escaped?_

"Granger!" he bellowed over his shoulder. "Kindly retrieve your godson!"

"UNCRUS!

Snape didn't respond to the voice. Not so anyone could _see_, at least. But, of course, he _was_ already formulating a plan of action; the child's voice had sounded far closer than it should have. That is to say, much closer to the greenhouse than to the house.

And, in her condition, he could hardly expect his wife to come chasing after Potter's spawn. Besides, she'd probably only remind him that _he_ was the one to whom Harry had entrusted the care of the younger of his sons. Never mind that _she_ was the one who wanted the bloody puffapods. Really, sometimes he thought his life had been easier living under both Dumbledore's and the Dark Lord's thumbs!

Abruptly, he stopped walking, and before young Albus could latch onto his leg again, he snatched the boy up and started off on his way again.

"You are a sneaky little thing," he told the child, not without admiration. "You'll probably be sorted into Slytherin. How will your father like that, I wonder?"

Albus beamed at him then planted a very wet kiss on his chin.

Snape faked a grimace as he swung open the greenhouse door.

Once inside, he placed the toddler on a low stool with a commanding "Stay!" and quickly found two baskets, one rather larger than the other.

"Here you go," he said, handing Albus the smaller of the two. "Up you go!"

He helped the boy to the floor and led him down long, straight aisles till they reached their destination.

"No touching!" he warned.

"Puff!" said Albus.

Severus eyed the grinning boy dubiously, but really, in this part of the greenhouse, there wasn't anything that could harm him — or anything he could harm — before Severus could stop him.

"Right," said the wizard. "When I give you a pod, you must put it in your basket for Aunt Hermione. _In_ the basket. Understand?"

Albus held up his basket and nodded with enthusiasm.

A short time later, Snape had stripped nearly two dozen pods from the plant.

"That should be enough to please Granger, don't you think?" He glance at the four pink pods nestled in the basket the small child held in two tiny hands. "Right. Let's go back, Albus."

Severus briefly considered relieving his charge of the basket, but one look at the pride in the boy's big green eyes as he cautiously made his way through the aisles changed the man's mind.

Hooking his own basket on his arm, he opened the door again and guided Albus out with a gentle hand on the child's shoulder.

"You must be very careful with Aunt Hermione's pods, Albus," he murmured. Not that he was worried. For the son of two Gryffindors, the child usually displayed an uncommon lack of recklessness.

"Yes, UncRus!"

SS~ASP~HG

"Oh, _there_ you are, sweetie! Were you helping Uncle 'Rus in greenhouse?" Hermione Granger didn't rise from her chair at the big kitchen table. "What a good boy you are! Come have a biscuit."

Severus scowled at the sugary display; Albus grinned happily and toddled over to her, basket held high.

"And what," Severus intoned haughtily, "do _I_ get for harvesting your puffapods _and_ babysitting all at once?"

Albus halted halfway to Hermione.

"Not a baby!" he insisted, stamping his foot.

As the two adults watched in mounting comprehension and horror, the little boy closed the rest of the distance to his godmother. He reached into his basket, pulled out a shining pink pod and bounced it off her belly.

"Baby!" he declared as the seedpod broke open and Hermione was covered in flowers.

She gaped at her husband before turning to young Albus. "That wasn't very nice," she told the smiling child.

Snape shook his head and grinned back at the boy. "No," he said, "but it _was_ vey Slytherin."

_Fin UncRus_

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><p>Disclaimer: No one and nothing you recognize belongs to me. All Harry Potter characters and concepts belong JK Rowling.<p>

This scene originally referred back to an earlier scene from _Metempsychosis_ in which Harry and Ginny press Severus to be their son's godfather:

Ginny cuddled her son closer, wondering if Severus knew how close he was to smiling. She didn't have to wonder long, however, as black eyes softened and thin lips stretched out and up.

"I see no reason to force a godparent of questionable reputation on the child," he said, using the dark chocolate voice Hermione hated anyone else noticing. "You've already burdened this ru— him enough with his names."

Albus Severus Potter chose that moment to wake up and fix accusing (so his mother liked to imagine) eyes (which already hinted at becoming his late grandmother's green) and focus on the man who insisted on denying him.

"Perhaps, next time," Severus offered vaguely, and possibly nervously. He looked directly at Ginny. "You are a Weasley, after all. I'm sure there will be another."


	3. Age Eleven Is Only A Number

Another deleted scene from _Metempsychosis_. This one is unbetaed and barely edited.

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><p>Even if he couldn't guess the cause, Harry Potter recognised the signs. The years he'd spent with the Dursleys had taught him more than he ever wanted to know about the pain of exclusion. He allowed his gaze to drift from the green-haired boy hiding in the hedgerow to the horde of Easter-sweet-filled children scarpering across the Burrow's huge garden, playing at alternately challenging and escaping from the sour-faced wizard at the centre of their make-believe battle.<p>

He looked back at the ill-tended bushes, just a few feet away from himself but a world away from the other children, to find his godson was riveted by the scene. And that the little boy's face was suffused with a sadness Harry knew only too well.

"All right, Ted?" Harry called. He hadn't really expected an answer, so he wasn't surprised when he didn't get one. Teddy didn't even look his way.

For moment, a wave of guilt threatened; although Harry managed to see his godson quite often, he admitted there were times he became so absorbed with work and the madness that was his own growing family, Teddy was just another beloved face across the dinner table, another excited voice begging details about an Auror's work or giggling over whatever adventure the whole lot of Potters and Weasleys had got up to lately.

Those days, he barely remembered Ted wasn't his own. But that didn't mean the boy didn't occasionally need individual attention. Harry walked over and sat in the grass, his back to bushes that all but hid the boy.

"Why aren't you out there leading the attack?" he asked casually.

"I was eleven ten days ago," Ted explained glumly.

As Victoire let out a mad screech and pounced on Snape's back, Harry considered that rather cryptic statement. _What does his birthday have to do with it?_

"Oh," he said, pretending to understand. "Too old to chase Severus round the garden now, are you?"

"He wouldn't want me to," Ted said. His voice was miserable, and if his godfather was guessing right, on the verge of tears.

"Too right!" he agreed with false cheer. "He's probably hoping you to save him from that lot."

Teddy 's gaze followed Harry's gesturing chin.

"I don't expect he does," the boy whispered. "Not according to Uncle George."

Harry was shocked. What sort of mad nonsense has George been spewing _now_? And in front of at least one of the kids!

"What do you mean?" he asked, his calm voice belying the fear and confusion twisting his guts. "What did he say?"

"It was when I went to your house at Christmas," Ted said sadly. "All us kids were supposed to be outside with Uncle 'Rus, but I came in because I was thirsty. From all the running, you know. Unce 'Rus was a snow dragon, and we were the fire knights."

Harry shot him an encouraging smile, trying to hold back the laughter that threatened. He remembered that night; Hermione had later confessed Severus spent that night in a steaming tub, moaning about old age. She'd rather thought her husband was exaggerating in a bid for wifely attention (if his post-bath endeavours were any indication, she'd added in an aside to Ginny), but Ted wouldn't understand that. _Harry_ hadn't wanted to understand that.

"I was in the kitchen, and I heard the grown-ups talking in the other room," Teddy continued, his voice rising in pitch and volume as he warmed to the subject. "Grandmother said she was still surprised at how _good_ Uncle 'Rus was at playing with us. Everybody else started laughing, and then Uncle George said he only likes us until we're _eleven_. And I've been eleven for ten days now!"

Unable to hold back this time, Harry barked out a laugh and, rocking back against the hedge, clutched his stomach. Teddy's look of impotent outrage was so comical, he nearly laughed all the harder, but the expression was also so close to hurt, Harry immediately sobered. Shoving an arm into the bush, he grabbed his godson and pulled the startled boy onto his lap.

"Oh, Ted," he said, shaking his head and smiling. "You _do_ know Uncle George likes to think he's funny, don't you?"

Teddy stared at him with that you-adults-are-so-stupid-I-don't-know-why-we-children-bother-talking-to-you sort of affronted arrogance.

"Well, he _is_ the owner of Wizarding Wheezes!" He folded his arms across his narrow chest.

"Right," said Harry, smiling again. "But you should know that doesn't mean he always actually is funny. George was teasing your grandmother, son. He didn't mean it."

Clearly hard at thought, Teddy pursed his lips until they morphed into a duck's bill. Harry's chuckle brought him out of his reverie. Without saying a word, the boy hopped to his feet as if he'd just realised that, even it wasn't too old to chase around ex-Dark wizards, eleven _was_ too old to sit on laps.

"How to you know for sure?" Teddy demanded. He sank back into the cover of foliage a bit, crossing his arms again and watching the other children begin to pile on top of Severus's prone body. Within seconds, no dark billow-ready robes were visible beneath the teeming mass of colourfully-clothed kids.

"Well," said Harry, "he came to your birthday party, didn't he?"

Teddy scowled, suddenly looking rather Snape-like, himself. His hair turned black and lacklustre. Even the boy's nose lengthened and started to bend downwards.

"Yeah, but that's probably only because Aunt Hermione _made_ him come! Uncle George said she's the real head of the Grape House."

Harry made a mental note to cast a Gibberish jinx on the jokester Weasley when he went inside. No matter that George was undoubtedly right about the dynamics of his friends' family life; some things needn't be talked about where children who had easy access to Extendible Ears might be lurking.

"Possibly," Harry said, following that with a low chuckle. "I doubt it, though."

Teddy tore his now-black eyes from the wizard whose face he was recreating in miniature.

"What makes you say that?"

"Hermione _hates_ flying," Harry explained. "Just the thought of it used to make her turn green."

Teddy's face turned the colour of a pale lime as he tried to work out where Harry might be going with his story. Harry wondered if the boy even realised he'd been morphing so much. The sight of a little green Severus Snape made him want to start laughing all over again.

"What did Uncle Severus give you for your birthday?" Harry asked helpfully.

Another handful of silent moments passed before Teddy shot his godfather a wide grin, his face changing back to normal.

"Right! Best junior-sized broom on the market, too!"

"Right," agreed Harry, smiling in return.

At that very moment — almost as if he'd been privy to the previous parts of the private discussion — Severus cried out above the din of shrieking kids, causing both spectators to look over.

"Help! Someone save me!" he called mock-plaintively. Black eyes stared directly at hedge behind and to the left of Harry. "I am under siege with no hope of succour from within!"

"I think Uncle 'Rus could use some help," Teddy said, glancing over to his godfather.

"I think you're right," Harry agreed.

"Oh, for Merlin's sake!" Severus bellowed. "If you lot think you can get the best of me just because Teddy Lupin leaves for Hogwarts this year, I'll have you know I have already made his grandmother promise to let him come home for _every_ holiday!"

The smaller children just screamed more and redoubled their efforts in subduing their captive.

"Hang in there, Uncle 'Rus," Teddy called, already running towards the fray. "I'll get you out of this mess."

Harry remained where he was, happy to just watch his family's antics.

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><p>Disclaimer: No one and nothing you recognise belongs to me. All Harry Potter characters and concepts belong JK Rowling.<p>

This ficlet refers back to the scene in _Metempsychosis_ where the adults are discussing Snape's child-minding skills with Andromeda Tonks:

"Oh no," George insisted. "Severus is wonderful with children. He loves them. Until they turn eleven and they all become dunderheads, of course."


	4. Chance Met

This ficlet is actually is another deleted scene from _Metempsychosis_. This one is far less light-hearted than the others, and it might still appear in _Metempsychosis_, though in a considerably altered form.

* * *

><p><strong>Present Day<strong>

Hermione lay back in her bed after a long stretch, a contented smile on her face. She could hear her husband murmuring in the nursery next door. She grinned at what little she could pick out: His intoxicating voice soothed their son, saying things like "all clean now, Ekkie" and "teach Mummy not to let you eat that, shall we?"

It was all unnecessary, really. The infant had quieted almost the instant his father had left her side for his. Soon enough, she didn't doubt, eleven-month old Echion Wilf Grape would sleep again – he'd been making it through most of the night for weeks now – then she and her husband could carry on with more interesting activities.

Ages ago, she'd exchanged wondering at the vagaries of Chance and the life it had dealt her for this sense of contentment, acceptance and, well, sheer happiness, to be perfectly honest. It was difficult to remember, at times, how easily things could have been different. So many factors, only slightly altered, could have brought about far different results.

Just like that, she was no longer happily ruminating on her life so far. In an instant, she found herself facing a barrage of what-ifs that couldn't possibly come to pass any longer, but which were no less disturbing for the impossibility.

Then, before she could slip into the kind of unprofitable despair Severus would rightly call absurd, she slipped into a memory – no more light than it was dark – that suggested, perhaps, there had always been some hope of happiness.

**SS~HG**

**Mid-June, 1997**

The loud staccato footsteps sounded without warning. Much closer than they should have been without giving at least _some_ earlier sign. There was barely time to press into a shallow recess in the stone wall. Almost as if someone had been sneaking up—

"If you persist in making things so easy for me, Miss Granger, I might begin to think you wish to make me happy."

The first words spoken in that cold, familiar voice unleashed a river of dread and self-recrimination. A harsh, sallow face suddenly appeared, seeming to hover in the darkness of the corridor and blocking her view from the alcove. Thin, cruel lips curled up in an unsightly semblance of a smile.

_Of all the stupid things to have done… Of all the people who could have caught me doing it…_ She raised her eyes to meet his. _Black_, she mused. _Black as the night that is his natural— _

Pushing away those unworthy thoughts, she concentrated on appearing respectful and contrite. Neither was difficult to achieve. Not under the circumstances.

"Sorry, sir," she managed to mumble, dropping her eyes to his large, boot-clad feet.

"Thirty points from Gryffindor for being out after curfew!" Professor Snape declared triumphantly, and her eyes snapped back up to see an equally victorious grin splitting his face. The dentists' daughter in her wanted to recoil at the sight of the yellowed, crooked teeth now exposed at her expense. The level-headed student suspected to do so would be unwise.

"So… easy," he murmured, stepping back and gesturing for her to come out. "I would not have been surprised," he continued in low, almost companionable tones as they began making their way back down the darkened hall, "to catch one of your dunderheaded friends out and up to no one good, but I did not expect to find _you_ here tonight. That is not to say I did not believe you reckless enough to make the attempt: your House traits all but ensure that you would." He let out a nasty, self-satisfied chuckle. "I thought, however, you had acquired more… cunning these last years. So, I wonder just why you allowed yourself to be caught tonight."

The admission stunned her. Professor Snape had always been more inclined to assign insulting – and usually inaccurate (_mostly_ wrong, anyway) – reasons for the less than stellar behaviour she and her friends sometimes felt compelled to engage in. That he might express curiosity instead was unsettling.

Without thinking about what she was doing, Hermione stopped walking and looked up at her dark-haired Defence Against Dark Arts teacher.

"I… I needed a quiet place to think, sir," she answered, even though he hadn't really asked. "Alone. I lost track of time."

"A place to blubber, you mean," he corrected, also halting. "A place to cry your little eyes out where no one could tell the brave Gryffindor was truly just a frightened little girl, perhaps? Come now, Miss Granger," he added, "did you think I did not notice your big, sad eyes were so red and swollen?" The words might have sounded kind, sympathetic even, had anyone else said them. In anything but a tone dripping with such contempt and derision.

She tamped down the instinctive indignation ignited by his harsh assessment. She _was_ scared. And she really didn't want anyone else to know. Only, it seemed that Professor Snape knew. There was nothing she could do about that now.

The irony of her situation was by no means lost on Hermione. She was alone in a little-used corridor with a man her best friends believed to be a fraud while drowning in her own lack of belief in herself. He wasn't anywhere near being the person she would choose to unburden herself on, but he already knew and he _was_ their Defence teacher.

"I know we're supposed to be brave," she told him stubbornly. She would _not_ show how it shamed her to admit the truth. "And that what Harry is going through is so much worse than it is for me; I mean, no one expects _me_ to save the world. I've really just got my parents to worry about. About what will happen to them because of me. That probably doesn't matter all that much in the larger scheme of things, but it's got me terrified.

"And I'm afraid— I'm scared of dying, Professor. Or of making a mistake that will get someone else killed, or even just harmed. I think that would probably be even worse."

She remembered the night Harry's insistence on saving his godfather had left Sirius dead and her cursed.

Professor Snape's mellifluous voice drew her out of that dark reverie.

"That you are afraid is a good thing," he told her. "You should not be ashamed of being intelligent enough to recognise current circumstances leave you at risk of harm.

"Having courage is not the same as being too stupid to recognise danger and to fear it. One is courageous when one able to act in spite of one's fear." He scowled at her. "No doubt many of your Gryffindor brethren would hear that as an endorsement for rushing recklessly into the fray without thought. That is not what I meant. Simply put, Miss Granger, when faced with warranted fears for one's own safety or for the safety of others, taking considered action and choosing the course which best mitigates the threat requires courage."

What he said was true; after all, it was something she'd seen being done every day for the entirety of her time at Hogwarts. Even when she hadn't been aware that it was happening.

"Like you do, sir?"

He didn't answer, and she got the feeling he wanted to look away from her. That he didn't only reinforced her belief in what she'd deduced.

"You're not as bad at this as you pretend to be, are you?" she asked before she thought better of it.

His questioning look and lack of visible anger spurred her to explain.

"I mean, you're good at dealing with students. Most people think you _hate_ the students – that you don't even like the Slytherins much, really – but that's not true. You're a born teacher."

"Hardly, Miss Granger. I teach because I have no choice; the headmaster needed a spy and I was the only one to offer. We had to come up with a reason for my presence at the school that the Dark Lord would find least suspicious. I do not like children and I am not, have never been and do not ever expect to _be_ 'good at dealing with' the dunderheads enrolled here."

She allowed that to tumble about in her mind for several moments before deciding she might get away with contradicting him if she presented a relevant example.

"You did wonderfully well with me just now, sir," she told him. "I feel much better than I did." A new thought occurred to her and started to spill from her mouth before she'd properly thought it out. "Maybe…" she trailed off, suddenly acutely aware of to whom she was speaking.

He arched an eyebrow. "'Maybe,' Miss Granger?" His smile was faintly mocking, but lacked its usual blistering coldness. "Come now, girl. Usually, you struggle _not_ to talk. You shouldn't waste a golden opportunity to speak now, whilst I am disinclined to deduct more points."

Hermione squeezed her eyes shut. Severus Snape in what passed for a good mood was an unknown entity and something she suspected should be savoured. She wasn't at all sure it would survive what she had been going to say.

Forcing herself to look him in the eye, she bravely pushed on. "I just thought… maybe after this is all over – after Vol— after You-Know-Who is gone – maybe you can… start over. Maybe, erm, if you wanted—"

"Oh, for Merlin's sake! Spit it out, Miss Granger!"

She swallowed, still feeling uncertain, even though his thundering voice didn't seem to hold any real anger. Just impatience bordering on exasperation.

Well, she had started, so…

"I thought perhaps if you married and had children of your own, it would be different. Maybe you wouldn't think they were such… dunderheads."

The expected explosion of vitriol and remonstration didn't come. Instead, his eyes widened in apparent shock, or perhaps disbelief, before he started shaking his head. His gaze left hers and then his head fell forward, the dark curtain of oily hair shielding his features.

Hermione felt cold fingers climb up her back as he began to tremble. She'd seen him angry, of course – many times – in a rage, even, but always before, his fury had appeared so tightly controlled. Precisely calculated to strike the maximum amount of dread in the objects of his displeasure.

A harsh, croaking sound, unlike anything she'd ever heard, burst from him. Alarmed, she started forward, hand outstretched, thinking to… she didn't know what.

"Professor," she asked, her voice timorous, "are you all right?"

Snape's head snapped up, and black eyes met and held hers. Glistening tears streamed down his pale, hollow cheeks and the choked sound only grew worse.

He was… laughing, she realised. And although she didn't see what was so funny about her suggestion, the urge to join him in this moment of levity was so strong, she had to bite the inside of her cheek to stop herself doing so.

After a long moment, he scrubbed the back of his hand across his eyes and took several deep breaths. The effort proved useless, however, when, after glancing at her, he started all over again.

Shaking her head ruefully, she stopped fighting back the answering smile tugging at her lips.

Several more deep breaths and many eye-scrubs later, he managed to gain some semblance of composure. Hermione was still grinning broadly even as she watched his expression return to it normal stiff mask.

She was still smiling into fathomless black eyes when his silky voice, as cold and forbidding as it had ever been, touched her ears.

"Surely, you can't be stupid enough to believe that, even should I survive this war, " he opined, disdain coating every word, "I would be free to live a normal life such as the one you envision for yourself."

Hermione had begun shivering at the suggestion he might not live beyond the war, and each word of his relentlessly stark vision of the future plunged her deeper into the dark, chilling abyss.

"That if I," he continued, seemingly unaware – or uncaring – of her distress, "by some miracle managed to avoid Azkaban, there would be even a single witch willing to tie herself to an ex-Death Eater. Or that if I should meet such a paragon outside the wards of an insane asylum, that any offspring produced from such an unholy union would worthy of praise!"

He surged forward, sneering, until his large nose was barely centimetres from hers.

"Perhaps, Miss Granger, I was too fulsome in my praise this evening, Your intellect is clearly just as lacking as I always believed your favoured companions' to be."

**SS~HG**

**Present Day**

Severus shucked off his dressing gown and tossed it on the end of the bed before crawling in beside his wife.

"From now on," he intoned, sliding a hand up her naked thigh and on to her ribs where he stopped to tickle the sensitive flesh, "either we refrain from religiously following whatever ridiculous advice you've read in _Wizard Whelp Weekly!_ – there are other methods of ensuring you son receives his daily requirement of iron and protein than feeding him strained spinach and mushy peas at his evening meals – or _you_ shall be the one to see to his hygienic needs when he wakes after his bedtime."

Severus shuddered in mock disgust at that task he had just completed. He knew that she knew that there was little he believed their son could do wrong at this stage, but Hermione's answering smile was enigmatic enough to dust off his as-of-late-disused suspicious nature.

"Lord, woman! Spit it out!"

Hermione wrinkled her nose at him. He could almost see the gears working in her head. She meant to wind him up, he could tell; she so rarely had an opportunity.

"'Spit it out'? Did you just perform Legilimency on me, Severus?" she asked, surely trying for arch allusion, but achieving something which sounded rather more like aggrieved admonition, instead. Severus decided to use her poor acting ability to his advantage.

"Of course not, ridiculous woman!" he snapped. "It is unconscionable! That you would have the effrontery to accuse me of such a thing. I thought by now I'd earned your approbation; clearly, I was in error."

Turning away from her as he uttered the last, his voice suffused with affronted emotion, Severus made sure she didn't catch sight of the lips he couldn't stop curving upwards.

He felt the mattress shift as she clambered closer. He felt her small hand slip round his waist and her heat press against his back as she embraced him from behind.

"You're faking," she pronounced, but hugged him close anyway. "In spite of your ridiculous theatrics, I will remind you that I love you and trust you implicitly. And I'll tell you what I'd been thinking about just as you came back. There was a night, in my sixth year, maybe you'll remember, but I doubt it because it was just before a very difficult time…"

Hermione moved up until her lips rested near his ear and spoke of time he'd given her a tiny glimpse of the man he might have been if….

"I remember," he murmured, turning in her arms when she was little more than half finished. "Silly girl that you were, you thought I should become a _father_. I meant everything I said that night, Hermione. If I had only known the lengths you were willing to go to prove me wrong."

She laughed softly, pressing her face against the faint scars on his neck.

"Well, you have to admit, I _did_ turn out to be right. But not through any advance planning. I wish I could take credit for that."

Severus, shoulders shaking and chest rumbling his quiet mirth, held her tighter.

"Just so you could remind me of the fact daily, no doubt. Holding it over my head that the know-it-all had bested me this time?"

"Exactly."

He covered her smug smile – learned from him, though she was ever loath to admit it – with a kiss that ensured she wouldn't forget he also was quite knowing in some areas.

* * *

><p>Disclaimer: No one and nothing you recognise belongs to me. All Harry Potter characters and concepts belong JK Rowling.<p>

**A/N:** This ficlet is excerpted and adapted from one of three epilogues I wrote for _Metempsychosis_ but decided didn't work as such. The others might appear in _Grapes_, as well. Then again, maybe they won't.


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